Country Escape's 2nd pond - Goldfish only

[j.w]

I have never noticed my fish laying on their sides like that so can't help you CE but sure hope they are ok and make it through w/ nothing wrong. When I google goldfish lay on their sides it comes up w/ either swim bladder or poor water quality.

 

[sissy]

I have not fed mine for over month

 

[callingcolleen1]

Like mine are all fine now, they only do that when the water temperature swings are extreme in the late fall during the first big hard freeze. Then only a couple of the goldfish, and they all recover just fine after a week or two. Never seen it happen to the koi ever.

I see this every fall for the past twently years, seems to happen to a few of my goldfish, but they never seem to die of it and recover well so I don't worry anymore and attribute it to sudden drop in water temperature. My water quality is very good, very little waste in my ponds as it all flows down and out of the ponds with the continuous water current.

It has never happened when the water is warm, only during first extreme freeze up. The fish are not bloated in my pond and all look healthy as usual.

 

[callingcolleen1]

have not fed my fish since September, feeding fish too late can be dangerous after September here up north, as I have seen very hard sudden freezes in very early October before.

 

[sissy]

I usually stop in October but that depends on how cold it is and how cold the water is also and what the temps are averaging at night and during the day

 

[CountryEscape]

Hmm ... yeah I wondered if it had to do with swim bladder, but I find it strange that so many of them are doing it. The thing I attribute it to is the overflow of the koi pond into the goldfish pond. I'm still of the opinion that my goldfish dying situation first week of August was due to the chemical that was sprayed on the surrounding corn fields, a fungicide. And, if that's the case and these goldfish die, it's because there was likely still some of the chemical in the koi pond (the koi don't seem to be affected by the chemical, only the goldfish), and was not as diluted as the goldfish pond, which had about 4 or 5 large water changes performed in a 10 day period after the deaths. I may be totally wrong, but will wait and see. I'll do another water test series maybe in the morning, if I get up earlier than usual, and see if any changes are happening. I know the amount of leaves on the bottom is minimal, and I hate to remove it all, knowing that the frogs and fish do lay in it in the wintertime. Thanks for all your help, everyone. We shall wait and see what happens. I'm hoping it's like Colleen has seen, and the quick change in water temps (we went from 50 to 15 in less than 24 hours here 2 weeks ago ...) and they will snap out of it soon.

 

[sissy]

We go from 55 day temp to 20's at night here .

 

[callingcolleen1]

I looked at your weather and see it is quite warm down there, I wish I had your weather!!! CE they should not be laying on there side if you are above freezing, I am taking about real cold weather, like well below zero Fahrenheit. They should not be laying on their side now as it is quite warm down there I see, I forget how much warmer you are than me sometimes. Like tonight, we are going down to -7 Fahrenheit, and tomorrow we will be at -24 Fahrenheit, that is like -31 Celsius!!! That will be much colder that we had all last year!!!! May be packing my bags of fish and going south!! Ha ha ha. (I have seen much colder weather like -45 Fahrenheit)

 

[CountryEscape]

OK, so this morning I woke at 5 a.m., didn't go back to sleep, so finally got up at 6:20, fed the horses and barn cats, and then took a flashlight and checked the ponds. I found only 2 fish laying on their sides, and not all the way sideways, just leaning over. The others are all swimming. Go figure! The 3 fantails were all spotted and swimming normally. I think of them as being more fragile than the larger goldfish. Both koi are fine, too. I wanted to confirm in my mind how many leaves were in there, and there are 2 areas about 3' diameter where there is a "bed" of leaves that are probably loosely laying 3" deep. If they sunk down and compacted, it would be less than 1" of leaf matter. Same with koi pond, nearly none in there though. So, leaving the leaves for the fish and frogs to snuggle into. And, the fact that I only saw a couple of the fish laying more sideways, I'm not going to worry. I suspect it has to do with the chemical in the water in the koi pond, that overflowed into the goldfish pond, as that is when I noticed them turn sideways, and was also when we went from very warm to very cold in 24 hours. So, I'm back to assuming there was still residual chemicals in the koi pond from August fungicide spraying, that overflowed and contaminated the goldfish pond ... again. I can't do much of a water change to the koi pond this time of year, but going to drain it down a few inches and refill it this evening, to help it out a little. All the koi are swimming normally, finally was able to spot them, as almost all ice is gone. I think all will be fine. I have ponds running as I do in summer, nothing extra right now. Will be shutting down the skippy and fountain when the next cold snap hits, though, so as not to worry about ice jambs on the waterfall, and also to not chill the water more, although that's the koi pond. Stream will continue to flow in the goldfish pond, as I ran that all last winter with no issues, as well as the bog in that pond. Only aerator will be running in the koi pond when it gets to teens in a couple of days.

 

[callingcolleen1]

It was probably just the sudden cold snap that you had last week, and the fish were not ready for it, now that their digestive track is clearing they should be fine. Like it only happens to the goldfish during the first hard freeze. Sounds like things should be fine, and a little bit of leaves won't hurt, I was worried that maybe their was lots of built up muck or something, but just an inch of leaves should be OK, as my ponds get lots of leaves too. The net helps me cause my ponds sit under many trees.

Going to hang my new red Led Lights over the window and freeze my butt off claiming the ladder in the night. I must be nuts for Christmas! Got a new stand up deer out front too that lights up. So many lights to string up still, once I get going there is no end....

 

[CountryEscape]

I got another extension cord, for the one that "walked away" since last Christmas. Now have all the outside lights on, and noticed the middle of one of my LED strings went out. Darn!!! Will have to wait until the weekend to check that, but then it is going to be so bitterly cold. Oh well, the other lights are on, so I don't really care. Actually, I think it's a whole strand, as they are short, only 30 lights, so I can swap out a strand that is going from bush to bush! Just realized that! Will do that maybe in the morning, when it's still balmy warm here. Only getting down to 50 or so tonight.

 

[CountryEscape]

All of the goldfish are up and swimming this morning, no more are laying on their side in the leaf matter on the bottom. So, that ordeal is likely over with ... or maybe not! We shall see when we get our next slam of cold frigid weather, and if they go sideways again, I'll at least know the warmer weather will bring them back out of it. This cold snap is going to come hard and fast. Dropping about 50 degrees in 48 hours, so going from mid 60's to teens by Fri. morning ... now that's a temp swing. Yuck!!!

 

[j.w]

Great to hear about your sideways fishy's! Maybe they got a hold of some holiday cheer and just had a really wild party the night before.

 

[callingcolleen1]

Well it is good they are back to normal now, they should be fine the next big freeze, providing they are not eating a big bug or other sources of protein food this late in the season, I think what happens, bugs fall in the pond lots and die just before freeze up, like wasps and other bugs, and the goldfish can't help but eat it, then comes a sudden cold snap and then their digestive track slows down with a bug stuck in the tummy, then comes the ice cold water, and they lay funny with a gut ache, that is my theory. I only see this during the first big cold snap, then they seem fine for the rest of the winter. Same thing every year for me. JW I don't think you get the extreme cold like we do, so you may not see this happen.

 

[j.w]

I went outside for about 16 seconds today and didn't see any fish at all. Think they all went down under and who knows if they will be laying on their sides or doing jumping jacks when it gets down to 13F tonight. They are on their own. Waterfall still running and air bubbles from tiny aquarium pump and geyser spout keeping ice off pond so far except in the floating ring. It has a thin layer of ice but sun is now melting that at a nice warm 36F.